Justice League Joss Whedons Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

Justice League: Joss Whedon’s Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

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Ray Fisher’s crusade against WB and Joss Whedon took a turn with the accusation of overt racism, but the fallout to Whedon’s reaction stole the show.

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Justice League Joss Whedons Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

Zack Snyder’s Justice League is on its way to HBO Max in 2021, but the full fallout of Warner Bros. and Joss Whedon’s rewrites and reshoot process has yet to be seen as Cyborg actor Ray Fisher continues to hammer Whedon and WB executives over the allegedly toxic environment they fostered during production.

While Fisher’s previous claims focused on toxicity and abuse of power exhibited before, during, and after Justice League’s production, a new interview with the actor highlights additional claims of explicit racism from Whedon and multiple WB executives. While Whedon hadn’t officially commented on anything related to Justice League’s reshoots or Fishers’ claims prior to this point, multiple statements from his attorney and spokesperson have been issued in response to the interview, sparking controversy and igniting new questions in an already complicated situation.

Through the comments from Whedon’s representatives, a partial retraction of Fisher’s quotes, edits to the original interview, and a deluge of coverage about the coverage, a few things have come to light about Ray Fisher, Joss Whedon, and what this means for the future of the investigation.

Ray Fisher’s Justice League Allegations Explained

Justice League Joss Whedons Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

Fisher initiated his campaign on June 29th, 2020 when he posted a tweet retracting his previous quotes praising Joss Whedon as Zack Snyder’s replacement at Comic-Con in 2017. Fisher has since revealed the comments from the cast during the panel came from talking points provided by Warner Bros. after they also lied to the cast to tell them Snyder was the one who chose Whedon as his replacement. Fisher followed his retraction with another tweet a few days later alleging “Joss Wheadon’s on-set treatment of the cast and crew of Justice League was gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable,” also calling out former DC president Geoff Johns and producer Jon Berg for enabling Whedon’s behavior.

In the weeks and months following, Fisher has made a number of additional accusations leveled at WB, Whedon, Johns, and more, even adding DC Films president Walter Hamada to the list. While Hamada wasn’t even with Warners during Justice League’s production, he’s become part of the case because Fisher claims Hamada offered to “throw Joss Whedon and Jon Berg under the bus” if he’d relent with his attacks on Geoff Johns, who he’d accused of threatening his career and other abuses of his power to protect his job during AT&T’s acquisition of Warner Bros. He’s expounded on these points along with additional accusations, but these attacks constitute the bulk of his claims until the newest batch stemming from his recent Forbes interview.

Up to this point, Fisher’s allegations didn’t include any mention of racist actions or intent from Whedon or anyone at Warner Bros., but in his interview with Forbes, Fisher changed that, alleging Whedon “ordered that the complexion of an actor of color be changed in post-production because he didn’t like the color of their skin tone” and said WB’s “erasure of people of color…was neither an accident nor coincidence.” These are understandably complicated claims and will be tough to back up. In order to prove racism in these decisions, Fisher doesn’t merely have to prove the specific alleged actions actually happened, but he also has to prove that the intent behind the actions was inherently racist. Proving intent can be tricky, although Fisher alleges “blatantly racist conversations were had and entertained—on multiple occasions—by former and current top level executives at Warner Bros. Pictures,” which, if he has proof, could help with these claims.

Related: Everyone Was Wrong About Justice League’s Snyder Cut

The question of evidence, in general, is one of the biggest points of confusion (and criticism) surrounding Fisher’s crusade. While he’s given examples of unprofessional or problematic conversations or situations, his word alone hasn’t been enough to convince everyone of his claims. The important thing to understand, though, is why Fisher says he’s making these claims in the first place. His stated goal is not to win a battle of public opinion or get people to “cancel” any of the accused parties, but to pressure WarnerMedia into conducting an impartial investigation into their subsidiary, Warner Bros., and take official action against the named individuals, should they be found guilty.

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He says he has witnesses and other evidence to prove what he’s saying to an investigator, and revealing that information outside of an investigation would tip-off the defense and potentially undermine his efforts to get WarnerMedia to take disciplinary action. Whether this evidence is sufficient to prove what he claims is unknown, but in reality, for Fisher’s purposes, the only person whose opinion of the evidence matters is WarnerMedia’s investigator.

Joss Whedon and WB’s Response Explained

Justice League Joss Whedons Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

Joss Whedon has remained largely quiet, issuing no official responses to anything Justice League related through the entirety of the fan campaign for the Snyder Cut and also stayed silent on Fisher’s initial accusations. Warner Bros., however, issued a statement on September 4th, characterizing Fisher as being ignorant of typical film production processes and accusing him of being uncooperative with investigators, despite claiming he wanted an impartial investigation to happen. Fisher responded to the statement, calling it a “desperate and scattershot attempt to discredit” him, and provided a copy of an email to his team and SAG-AFTRA expressing concerns over the investigator’s agenda. In his Forbes interview, Fisher revealed WarnerMedia had since told him the investigator was fired for lying to them, but the company refused to retract the WB statement discrediting Fisher. The new investigator appears to have some of the qualities Fisher is looking for, as they handled the case of former Warner Bros. chairman and CEO, Kevin Tsujihara, before he left the company due to sexual misconduct.

After Fisher’s new interview, Whedon’s attorney and publicist issued responses. His attorney’s response addressed the claim that Whedon changed a POC actor’s complexion, dismissing the accusation due to Fisher’s use of the phrase “my becoming informed,” saying it implied the information was hearsay, obtained from someone else and that Fisher had no first-hand knowledge of the situation. The statement said color changes in post-production are common practice and executed by a number of individuals, and the fact that Snyder shot on film and Whedon shot on digital complicated the colorization process even more as extra work had to be done to match the two mediums. As for the removal of multiple POC characters, Whedon’s representative said those decisions were made prior to Whedon taking over on the film.

The most notable thing about the responses from Whedon’s representatives is they only address the issue of racism and completely ignore Fisher’s claims of abuse, career threats, and other toxicity from Whedon. As for the sufficiency of the explanations, they don’t deny that skin color was changed or POC actors were disproportionately cut, just that those changes weren’t Whedon’s fault, although Whedon’s rewrites earned him a writing credit and he drastically changed Snyder’s vision for the film, so it seems odd to claim he was locked into any particular editorial decision that had been made before he came on the project.

The last point to make here is that the reactions from Whedon’s camp were an attempt to revise the media narrative, yet after months of serious accusations from Fisher, Whedon hasn’t issued a cease and desist or even threatened to sue him for defamation, something Fisher explicitly called out during his appearance at a virtual panel for JusticeCon over the summer.

While this certainly isn’t clean evidence proving Whedon is guilty of all the things Fisher has claimed, it should be noted that a defamation lawsuit would result in a discovery process where the truth of whatever happened during Justice League’s production would be subject to review. Even if it’s a fraction of what Fisher has alleged, it wouldn’t look good for Whedon (and others).

Forbes’ Handling of Joss Whedon’s Reaction Explained

Justice League Joss Whedons Racism Accusation Fallout Explained

The newest wrinkle in the story revolves around the way Forbes seems to have handled the interview after Whedon’s statements. The interview initially included Fisher’s accusation that Whedon changed the complexion of an actor of color, but after Whedon’s attorney provided their response, the quote was removed entirely and the headline was also edited to remove a reference to the erasure of actors of color. No reason was given for these changes other than a note mentioning changes had been made and statements from Whedon and WB had been added.

In addition to the changes to the Forbes article, the contributor who conducted the interview, Sheraz Farooqi, is now listed as a “former contributor” by Forbes. Given the involvement of Whedon’s legal team, this change is certainly concerning, especially given the nature of the interview and the fact that Fisher accused Whedon of threatening the career of someone associated with production (one of the accusations ignored in Whedon’s response). Forbes hasn’t commented on the writer’s departure yet, but given the visibility of the story, and social media attention generated by his departure, that may change soon.

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Why Ray Fisher is No Longer the Focus of the Story

To this point, coverage of Fisher’s campaign largely focused on Fisher and his claims, but this story is seeing a very different reaction as Fisher has almost been sidelined while follow-up coverage examines how Whedon, Forbes, and others have handled the situation. In addition to the odd partial denial/deflection from Whedon and unexplained retraction from Forbes, coverage from other sources also resorted to unconventional behavior, such as Deadline’s inclusion of a comment on the Forbes interviewer’s previously expressed appreciation for Zack Snyder’s films, implying a bias in favor of Snyder tainted the interview, which is an odd swipe to take considering the quote came from Fisher, not Farooqi.

Meanwhile, The Hollywood Reporter, Page Six, Vanity Fair, and others found Forbes’ removal of the quote particularly interesting, making it a focal point in their own coverage, also including the text of the original quote (which has still not been removed from their respective articles).

It’s especially odd for Forbes to be the one bearing the brunt of the criticism when the accusation was made by Fisher and Forbes did its due diligence in providing Whedon an opportunity to comment prior to publication. Obviously the quote is a scathing indictment of Whedon if it’s true, but censoring the article after publication isn’t the typical approach to these situations, and if the contributor’s departure is also a result of Whedon’s complaints, that’s even more questionable, and again, if Whedon’s lawyers are threatening to sue for defamation, the case of libel would rest with Fisher, not Forbes or the contributor who conducted the interview.

In the United States, a journalist isn’t liable for libel unless something called “actual malice” can be established. To establish actual malice, the accusation would need to be proven untrue and it would also need to be proven Forbes was aware the statement was untrue and published anyway or that Forbes didn’t even make an effort to determine if it was true before publishing. According to the original text of the piece, Whedon’s representatives were given an opportunity to respond to the claim, but didn’t. As such, Forbes did their proper due diligence.

Some have argued additional sources of input should have been sought for fact-checking, but the article was simply a straightforward interview with Fisher, not an investigative piece or expose where Forbes was making or supporting any claims of their own. As such, the removal of the quote becomes even more odd as its not censoring an overzealous or hyperbolic statement by Forbes, but it’s actually censoring an accusation of abuse by Fisher, seemingly at the behest of the man he’s accusing. In most other modern Hollywood contexts this would result in far more outrage. Forbes and Whedon may end up facing some tough questions about the departure of Farooqi. The optics of firing a POC contributor for an interview they conducted where a POC actor accused Whedon of being racist and threatening someone’s career are certainly not good. It’s the exact same kind of behavior Fisher is already accusing Whedon of.

Also of note here, Forbes says they stand by the updated piece, which still contains all of Fisher’s accusations other than the removed quote about the skin color change.

Fisher’s crusade is far from over, as he said he’ll keep on the pressure as long as he has to, but this newest chapter certainly introduces a lot more questions than answers. Fortunately, Fisher and WarnerMedia seem to agree on the investigator for now, meaning the case could finally be moving forward. With how messy things have become, bringing as much to light as possible seems like the best solution so we definitively bring an end to the 2017 Justice League saga and Warner Bros. and the DCEU can finally leave the entire debacle in the rearview mirror.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/justice-league-ray-fisher-joss-whedon-racism-forbes/

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